REGISTRATION: 101
For newly-admitted high school students
Welcome to the University of Calgary.
We’re thrilled to have you join our
community this fall!
As a newly-admitted student, you probably want to know how to prepare for
this fall. This guide outlines what will happen between now and your first day of
classes, and provides the steps you’ll need to follow to successfully register for
your courses in May.
Special note for students admitted at later dates:
You’re receiving this booklet because the information is still relevant to you, regardless of when you’re admitted.
We encourage you to read through the timeline completely to ensure you don’t miss any of the steps. In the coming
weeks and months, you’ll receive additional communication from us that elaborates on the key aspects of registration
that are specific to the month in which you’re admitted.
Engineering and nursing students:
If you were admitted to the faculties of engineering or nursing, you’ll receive information directly from your
faculty outlining the specific courses that you’re required to complete in your first year.
TIMELINE: A roadmap to registration
JANUARY AND FEBRUARY
Course registration doesn’t begin until May, but you can begin familiarizing yourself now
with the resources available to you. This will help ensure you’re prepared when the time
comes for you to register for your fall and winter term courses.
1. University calendar
The university calendar (ucalgary.ca/pubs/calendar) is a great reference tool for all students. The fall and
winter course schedule is available March 1. Before then, you can browse the courses of instruction section to
view all of the courses UCalgary offers, along with descriptions for each course.
Spend some time building a wish list of courses that interest you so you know what you might want to take
when the course schedule launches. Not sure which courses you should be considering? Find your faculty in
the university calendar; that secion will contain a list of courses required for your degree program.
2. Schedule Builder (SB)
All UCalgary students are encouraged to use the schedule builder tool (SB) when creating their schedule.
SB is a web-based tool you’ll use to help you build potential class schedules and register for courses.
We encourage you to begin familiarizing yourself with this tool now by watching the instructional videos
on how SB can assist you in creating a schedule free of time-conflicts. The videos can be found at
ucalgary.ca/registrar/registration/schedule-builder.
3. Advising Resources
FACULTY ADVISING
Each faculty has program advisors you can speak to about course planning, course selection, registration,
program progression and more. You can view their contact information and hours of operation at
ucalgary.ca/registrar/registration/advising. If you need to access support from your faculty program advisor,
you should plan to do so starting in April.
STUDENT SUCCESS CENTRE
The Student Success Centre (SSC) offers a range of academic support including help choosing a major,
personalized academic planning, learning support programs, and more. As a newly-admitted high school
student, you can access a program called New Student Registration Assistance (NSRA) that helps you select
your first-year classes and build your course schedule. NSRA is available starting in early May.
To learn more about NSRA, visit ucalgary.ca/student-services/student-success/advising/nsra.
ENROLMENT ADVISING
Once you’ve started registering for classes, our enrolment services advisors can help you identify and
troubleshoot any registration issues you may have. You can find their contact information at
ucalgary.ca/registrar/contact-us.
Note: you can begin registering for courses from your enrolment appointment date (an enrolment
appointment date is the exact date and time you can begin registering for courses in the fall and winter
terms. View your enrolment appointment in your Student Centre [my.ucalgary.ca]).
HOW-TO GUIDES
Enrolment Services has a number of how-to documents you can access. They provide step-by-step
instructions for some of the more common self-service features you’ll find in your Student Centre
(my.ucalgary.ca) such as registering for courses, accessing your schedule, requesting a transcript, and
reviewing your financial account. Now would be a good time to begin familiarizing yourself with these
documents as you prepare for registration in May.
MARCH
The course schedule for fall and winter is available to view in March.
In March, you’ll be able to view the schedule of courses that’ll be offered in the fall and winter semesters.
You can start reviewing these courses and building a schedule using the schedule builder tool, and we
recommend using the First-Year Degree Guide to help you do this.
The First-Year Degree Guide (ucalgary.ca/degreeguide/) is an online tool that allows you to view suggested
courses you should register for in your first year of studies. In addition to required courses, you’ll also have to
complete a number of option courses (these vary depending on your faculty). An option is a course that allows
you to explore an area of interest that falls outside of your chosen major or degree. At UCalgary, the first year of
each program typically includes a number of options.
Since registration doesn’t happen until May, it would be a good idea to write down your required courses and
options. That way you’ll be able to easily find them when it comes time to choose your courses and build
your schedule.
Unsure if the schedule you’ve generated needs adjustmenting? Need help choosing some of your courses?
Your faculty program advisors will be available to provide some guidance starting in April.
Important Terminology
It’s important to begin familiarizing yourself with some of the common registration-related terminology used at
UCalgary, such as:
Registration: selecting and
enrolling in the individual courses
that you’ll take in your first year of
studies at UCalgary.
Course restrictions (these will be
indicated by a purple star): Many
courses are reserved for students
who are admitted to a specific
degree program or a particular
major. Restrictions tell you who
can register for the course, and
when. You may need to wait for a
restriction to expire before you can
register in some courses.
Prerequisite: This is a course (or
courses) that you must complete
before you can enrol in a given
course. If a course is specified as a
prerequisite, you must achieve pass
standing in that prerequisite before
you can take the course (unless a
specific grade is indicated, in which
case you need to achieve at least
that grade).
Please ensure you carefully review the prerequistes
for the courses you select. You’ll need to complete
any high school pre-equisites by the end of June to
retain your spot in these courses.
Antirequisite: Courses that cannot
both be taken for credit becuase
they are too similar to each other.
Corequisite: Two courses that must
both be taken at the same time.
Enrolment appointments: Your
individual enrolment appointment
is the exact date and time when
you can begin enrolling in courses.
You’re eligible to enrol any time
after your enrolment appointment
arrives, and up until the add/
swap deadline for each term.
Learn how to view your enrolment
appointment here: ucalgary.ca/
registrar/registration/enrolmentappointments.
Lecture: Classroom-based
instruction.
Lab: Smaller course components
that supplement your lectures labs are just as important as
lectures!
Tutorials: These provide
opportunities for you to ask
questions, discuss course and
reading material, and receive
additional assistance.
Waitlists: If a course is full, you may
be able to join a waitlist and wait
for a seat to open in the class (if
this functionality is enabled*). If a
student drops the class, a seat will
open up and be automatically filled
by the next student on the waitlist.
*Note: waitlists aren’t enabled for every class
Multi-term courses: A multi-term
course runs over both the fall and
winter terms. You must register for
the course in each term, and also
enrol in the same class section.
Multi-term courses are identified
as “A” for fall and “B” for winter.
This is a good time to begin
thinking of questions you’d like
to ask your faculty program
advisors when you meet with
them in April.
APRIL
This month, the advisors at your home faculty will be ready to meet with you about
questions you have regarding registration, course selection, and schedule planning.
They’ll also be able to review the course schedules you created for yourself to ensure there aren’t any issues with
the courses you’ve selected. You can schedule an appointment with an advisor from your faculty by reaching out
to the faculty directly. Their contact information can be found at ucalgary.ca/registrar/registration/advising.
In April, we’ll be offering numerous registration-related workshops. Keep an eye out for emails from us that
contain information on workshop topics, as well as details about the event dates and ways to register for them.
MAY
Registration month! As a first-year student, you’ll be able to start enrolling in
courses between May 6 to 8.
Be sure to familiarize yourself with your Enrolment Appointment date, which is the exact date and time you can
beging registering for your fall and winter classes. You can view your enrolment appointment in your Student
Centre (my.ucalgary.ca).
Once your enrolment appointment date arrives in May, you’ll be able to finalize registration into the courses that
you’ve preselected and added to your shopping cart using the schedule builder.
Find out when you can register
Visit your Student Centre (my.ucalgary.ca) to view your enrolment appointment, which is the exact date and
time you can begin registering for your fall and winter courses. We encourage you to register as early as your
enrolment appointment allows, but you can register for courses up until the last day you’re allowed to add
courses for the term (you can check this and other important dates in the Academic Schedule: ucalgary.ca/
pubs/calendar/current/academic-schedule). Make sure you register for both the fall 2020 and winter 2021
terms at the same time.
UCalgary students have the ability to register for courses either directly through their Student Centre
(my.ucalgary.ca) or by using the schedule builder (SB) tool, which is also found in Student Centre.
We recommend using SB to build and register in a schedule initially, but make any course changes
(add, drop, swap and/or edit) directly through your Student Centre.
Registering using Schedule Builder (SB)
All UCalgary students are encouraged to use SB
when creating their schedule. You should begin
creating potential class schedules now using SB
to ensure your registration goes as smoothly as
possible in May. To watch instructional videos
on how SB can help you create a schedule free
of timeconflicts, visit ucalgary.ca/registrar/
registration/schedule-builder.
Registering using the Student Centre
Although we encourage you to use SB to
register for courses, you can also register using
your Student Centre (my.ucalgary.ca). To learn
how to directly register for courses and edit
your schedule in your Student Centre, visit
ucalgary.ca/registrar/student-centre/howguides. Please keep in mind that you’ll only be
able to add classes to your shopping cart until
your enrolment appointment arrives (after that
date arrives, you can register for your classes).
Important note for international students:
All newly-admitted international students must apply for the appropriate immigration documents as soon as possible.
You must do this so you can legally study in Canada. For more details, visit the International Student Services
Immigration website. You may also email international.advice@ucalgary.ca if you require assistance.
We hope this information has helped you learn about the steps that follow being admitted to UCalgary.
We’ll continue to send you additional course registration information, workshop invitations and more to help you
prepare for course registration in May.
Once again, we want to congratulate you on gaining admission to UCalgary. We welcome you to our community
and look forward to supporting as you pursue your degree!
Sincerely,
The Office of the Registrar